I think this will be about 2 chapters all up, I have a few other stories I have been trying to work on and start but there are very few stories for Reade/Zapata, so I needed to write my own in the mini break.
I own nothing.
Enjoy!
There had been multiple times throughout this mission that she had been unsure if she would succeed; the moment she had realised just how hard it would be to walk away from everyone, when she had watched the entire room around her fall to the ground, unsure if she was going to be next, confronting Reade in his apartment and more recently when she had been kidnapped and interrogated by fake CIA agents, all because Madeline got a little unsure of her, but this time felt different, because at least if she had not survived, she had won.
Slumping down against a crate, she closed her eyes for a moment in an attempt to make the dizziness disappear, her fingers sticky and wet from the blood seeping through her shirt and her ears pounding as she breathed through the pain. She had left Madeline in a room that she knew her team would find her, having had gone after the last of the older woman's helpers, knowing full well that it would take her away from the possible route out of the building that had been rigged to blow in a time frame that was too short for her to do much.
Opening her eyes, Tasha glanced towards the doorway she had come through, the pool of blood from the man she had shot a lot larger than when she had last looked and the realisation that she had been down longer than she had realised kicked in, her limited time was disappearing quicker than she could think.
Pressing as firmly as she could into the wound on her side, she ignored her body's complaints and forced herself up, she had come to far and given up too much to not at least try to get out. Her vision was blurring more with each step she took but she continued towards what she believed was the opposite direction of where the bomb had been placed; Madeline's last line of defence, if all else was lost the woman would get some solace in bringing everyone else down with her too.
Rounding a corner, she heard what sounded like footsteps coming closer to the room she was now in, unsure if it was her mind playing tricks or not, she paused to listen, her answer coming as the door opened and a gun pointed through. Raising her gun shakily towards the approaching figure, with a sudden hint of survival kicking in to cover the lack of strength, her brain barely registering the friendly face as they lowered their weapon and rushed towards her.
"Tasha?!" Reade breathed a sigh of relief, concern quickly taking over as he saw she was struggling to stand. Wrapping an arm around her, he took her weight as he led them back out the way he had come in, his other hand holding his gun tight ready to protect them.
Leaning against him, she actually felt safe for a moment, as she focused on keeping up the quick pace he was making them go, both knowing full well that they needed to be out of the building already. A hint of hope rose in the back of her mind, hope that she might actually get out of this mission alive, but it was quickly replaced by the fear that she might get them both killed.
The answer to her question came moments later as he pushed them through a door a few moments later and the bright sunlight hit her face. He continued his path towards an ambulance in the distance, as she glanced over to her former team, locking eyes with Madeline for a moment and nearly stumbling at the ice in her stare, breaking away she caught the mixture of questioning and disapproving looks from the team, even in her state she could tell Reade was ignoring the same looks, something that she tucked away and hoped she would remember later.
As they close enough to the ambulance that the paramedics saw her, she was quickly surrounded by people ready to help but Reade seemed focused on getting her to the vehicles stretcher before he let her go. The distinct sound of the building exploding ripping through the relief that had fallen over then the moment they had made it to the vehicle, Reade holding its back door in a manner to shield them from any debris from the building as they watched it crumble from the force.
She barely remembered the ride to the hospital, waking a while later to the beeping, busy noise and sickly clean smell that could only be one place. Opening her eyes, she glanced around the white room, attempting to sit up without getting caught up in the cords connected to her body, her actions catching the eye of a nurse walking by, who smiled quickly at her before hurrying off, most likely to fetch someone to talk to her.
Her suspicions of the nurse were right when a man and woman in doctor's coats entered, followed by a blank Reade. She was surprised to see him there and it made her wonder if it was to take her into custody once given the all clear, he had made it clear that she was simply an asset and her only usefulness was catching Madeline, which she had done; she didn't have Keaton to get her out of a black site anymore, so CIA or FBI; it didn't make much of a difference to her.
"Miss Zapata, I am glad to see you are awake." The male doctor spoke, the way he seemed to be keeping his distance off her bed not lost on her and she had to wonder if they thought she was law enforcement or the enemy.
"Guess I lived." She stated nonchalantly, making eye contact with Reade for a moment before picking up the cup in front of her as an excuse to look away.
"Are you happy for us to update you with Agent Reade in the room? We can do this more privately if you prefer." The doctor spoke again softer than before, noticing the interaction between the two.
"It's fine." She stated, placing the cup back on the tray in front of her, as she wondered if the fact she wasn't handcuffed was a good sign.
"You had a small gunshot wound to the abdomen, not much more than a graze that we patched up, along with a couple other cuts and bruises that you'll need to keep an eye on, we stitched up the more serious ones. The bigger issue is that you were dehydrated and malnourished, which was making your wounds make you weaker than they should, but we have you on an IV full of much needed nutrients and your hydration levels are much better." He rattled off the basics of her injuries to her as she watched him hold himself back, clearly wanting to ask questions but knowing better than too.
"I would also like you to have a chat with our counsellor before you go." The female doctor spoke up, clearly going against a decision the two of them had decided upon before coming into her room.
"Why?" She asked a lack of anything to her tone that she then realised probably didn't help her situation.
"Well, your displaying clear symptoms of being held against your will and of being tortured, pretty seriously by what I've seen, so I would like you to at least have a quick chat with them first." The concern about her welfare evident on the doctor's voice, but Tasha couldn't help but feel it would dissipate if she knew the things she had done.
"When am I leaving, by the way you two talk it sounds as if I am being discharged pretty soon?" Tasha questioned, ignoring the statement and any questions it brought with it as she glanced at the small group at the end of her bed.
"We have a plane waiting to go back to New York." Reade spoke authoritively and his reason for being there dawned on her, he was only there to escort her to the ride home; or to a dark hole, she still wasn't sure which it would be.
"I would prefer if you stayed a little while longer, at least to keep an eye on your wounds." The other woman spoke, dropping her other issue for now. "But we cannot force you to stay."
"If you choose to leave, we will give you some medication for the pain and to try to stop infection, and some supplies to change the bandages if needed, but I would highly suggest going into a hospital as soon as your stateside." The male doctor explained further, the appearance of her having a choice nearly making her laugh, if only they knew the whole story.
"I'll be fine, changed a few bandages in my time." She stated, pretending to have made the decision all on her own, but they were right and the bruises on her wrists would really hurt if the handcuffs went back on.
Stepping out of the room a little while later having changed into the now clean clothes that she had come in with, bar her shirt that they had cut open, but having been given one of the hospitals light green scrub shirts to wear instead, she definitely felt more refreshed than she had in the last few weeks.
"Ready?" Reade spoke coldly, as if he was here for a job and that was it; which she supposed he was.
Tasha nodded in response, handing the clipboard she was holding to a nurse at the nurses' station as they started their way to the elevator. The coldness between them hurting, but she pushed it down, knowing she had hurt him more and it had been her choice, so she didn't deserve anything but.
Their silence continued in the drive to the airport, only interrupted by a call coming through midway there, the silence returning as quickly as the call ended. As they approached the hanger, she wasn't sure if she should be worried or thankful that they had a private jet waiting for them, the unanswered question about her fate slowly eating away at her.
Following behind him quietly, at the very least she knew that was all she could do at the moment, choosing that it was safer to prepare for the worst than to hold on to the slither of hope. She took the stairs to the plane slowly, ignoring the way he waited at the top as to ensure she didn't try to run and hated that she couldn't read if he was impatient or concerned as she past him and made her way to a seat.
Curling in against herself, she sat in a seat next to a window silently, letting the other members of a team she was once a part of move around the plane, only stopping what they were doing as the plane moved towards the runway and then took off, soaring towards its destination and potentially towards her hell.
"How are you feeling?" Patterson asked as she sat opposite her, breaking her train of thought as the concern from her once close friend brought a tinge of hope.
"Been better." She responded with a weak smile, turning to face her and watching as Rich sat next to her, the two looking as if they were about to start an interrogation of their own kind.
"We got Madeline red handed, HCI Global won't come back from this." The blonde stated getting down to business.
"Good." At least it hadn't ended up all being for nothing, that was something she could hold on to where ever she ended up.
"Why?" Her old friend asked, her question drawing the other occupant to the conversation, as Reade made his way over, having no choice but to sit on the spare seat next to her.
"Why?" Tasha questioned the question, not sure which part of it the why referred to.
"Why did you agree to it?" Rich brought up the first question the group seemed to have for her.
"It's not like he had anyone else lining up to do it, I couldn't exactly turn it down." She tried to explain, but this group was FBI through and through, they had never understood why she had gone CIA and so she couldn't expect them to understand why she had been prepared to give up everything, including her job at the CIA for it.
"Was it because we weren't talking and you two were barely talking?" Patterson got right to the question that had been eating at her, wanting to understand her mindset.
"I won't lie," She started, her comment gaining a huff from the man next to her, "It helped me agree to it in the first place, but when it started, us all being friends again made walking away the hardest thing I have ever done."
"Yet you did it anyway. You left without a word and joined forces with our enemy." The blonde argued, the hurt that she had and was still feeling evident in her tone.
"Even to my standards, that's not right." Rich spoke up, trying to cut through with tension that was filling up the small plane quickly.
"You could have just told us." Reade near repeated the words he had told her when he had her in the FBI just over a week prior.
"I couldn't risk it." Tasha told him sadly, knowing how the words sounded the moment she said them.
"Risk what, we were your team." The were in his sentence cutting the deepest, she knew they weren't a team anymore, but it still hurt to be reminded.
"I had to go deep Reade, I couldn't have any outs, it was all or nothing." She tried explaining from a different angle, she knew they all had their own thoughts as to why she had done it the way that she had and that they were all still hurt by those reasons.
"All you needed to do was tell us enough that we would have known you weren't betraying us, we wouldn't have sold you out." He fired back, bringing trust back into it, because if there was anything that this team had survived on it was trust.
"If I told you and anything went wrong, if I failed I wouldn't have forgiven myself. I couldn't risk anything, and if I succeeded and you guys didn't forgive me that was a something I would have to live with." She told him softly, knowing he had every right to feel the way he did but she hadn't had the choice, after everything she had done, this mission had been the very least she could offer, no matter the cost.
"And if it went wrong, what, we would have just never known the truth?" Patterson asked, anger flaring up in her tone as she listened to the reasoning and knew that it had been a very real possibility.
"Keaton promised he would tell the team the truth if it went bad." The brunette responded, the sentence sinking in as the group realised that it was an outcome that she had not only understood but had had a plan for as well.
"Then why come to me that night." Reade broke the silence, all eyes flying to him the moment he spoke. Looking around the group she knew the other two had at least some understanding that they had crossed a line, but they hadn't quite known how far over the line they had gone and the other two was just as surprised as she was that he was bringing it up now.
"I know I shouldn't have, it was selfish, but like I told you, I thought I would never see you again." She stared him down like she had in the interrogation room, needing him to know that as much as she had lied and hurt him, that her feelings were real and that she hated hurting him.
"You also told me that you always loved me, but I guess just not enough to tell me the truth." He threw her words back at her, both of them ignoring the way Rich was watching them as he was watching a day time soap show.
"You and I both know I would have ruined us anyway." She sighed, a lone tear escaping as she droped his eye contact as and wishing he would drop the topic for a time more private, but also glad that he was somewhat prepared to talk to her and that he had clearly confided in Patterson, who was watching the two with a sad expression, having had conversations with both, she understood that they were both in pain.
"How is it you keep making that choice for me?" Reade used a previous conversation against her once more and like before, not really expecting her to answer that statement.
"How about we stop there before someone says something they can't take back?" Rich spoke up, starting to get a touch uncomfortable, confrontations; especially those in a confined space, were not at the top of his list for enjoyable situations.
"Oh, we have said way worse to each other." Tasha couldn't help but joke, her words dropping the group back into silence.
"Where's Jane and Weller, are they okay?" Tasha asked after a while, feeling comfortable enough in the group to start asking her own questions.
"Chasing up a lead for Jane." Rich responded without thinking, his answer drawing an inquisitive look from the brunette and a sharp glare from the man opposite him. "And I've said to much."
She knew better than to push her luck on the subject, clearly there was going to be things that she would miss and they all barely seemed to tolerate her, let alone trust her with information on the two main members of the team, but it still hurt. Watching Rich get up and head towards the planes far corner where his laptop lay waiting, Tasha realised that he was distancing himself before he said anything further.
"Wait." She spoke up as Reade moved to stand as well, her request gaining a glare, but he remained seated none the less, as she got the courage to ask the question haunting her the most. "What's going to happen to me?"
"I'm not handing you over to the CIA if that's what you're worried about." His words didn't answer her question fully, but they gave her a glimmer of hope, something that was quite dangerous to her right now.
"What then?" She pushed further, she mightn't have the right to push about anything else, but she knew this was the one topic that no one could blame her for wanting an answer to.
"Well they are going to want to debrief you and as Keaton is still unconscious and though Claudia backed you up to me, she might not be so forthcoming with them, but for the mean time you'll remain in FBI custody, might even set you up in a safe house if it comes down to it." He explained, trying to sound as if he was talking to any other informant but the three of them knew that he was bending his power as deputy director.
"Really?" Tasha asked, hope slipping into her tone for the first time in a long time and she couldn't stop the small smile crossing her features.
"Well the end result was beneficial to the FBI, least we can do is make sure you don't get thrown into some dark hole." He reasoned to everyone, including himself, as he looked down to give himself a chance to school his features.
"Thanks." She responded, relief pushing aside her pain for a moment as she suppressed the urge to hug him, knowing that that action would not be well received.
"We should probably go over some key points before they get a chance to brief you though, like for starters, were the doctors correct when they said that you had been tortured recently?" He switched back to a line of conversation that he was in control of.
"Yes." She answered too coolly, the only sign that the question even bothered her was the way that she pulled her legs a bit closer, even though the action would cause her pain.
"Who?" Patterson spoke up for the first time in a while, the news surprising and concerning her, she knew it hadn't been an easy mission, but this was something else.
"They grabbed me when I was supposed to meet Del Toro, pretended to be CIA or were CIA working for Madeline, but they tried to get me to admit that I was undercover, all I knew was that if I told either option the truth they would have killed me." Tasha started explaining calmly as if it was not her story she was telling.
"Guess you held out." Reade responded coldly but watching her closely non the less.
"Reade!" Rich's voice rang out from over his laptop screen, clearly requesting his presence with what he had been working on.
"We will pick this up later." Reade stated as he rose and walked away from them, Patterson following closely behind, only pausing at another seat to grab a blanket which she then passed it to Tasha.
Folding the blanket into a makeshift pillow, she placed it on the window, figuring she might as well attempt to sleep or at the very least pretend to, to allow her a quiet flight as she knew that they would all leave her alone if rest and right she had to process the last couple of days. She just wished that she could be 100% certain that they would be able to protect her from the CIA, Keaton had been the only one who would have been able to talk them down and even though her mission had succeed, she knew that the CIA would be unhappy with the way she had dragged their name through the mud.
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